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YASoB (was Re: some news)

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YASoB (was Re: some news)

"Alan Kay" wrote:

"... it really bothers me that so many people on this list
are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!)
But that's another soapbox."

Dear Seasoned Squeakers,

I have followed this list for a while and I have a feeling
that Alan Kay is not particularly fond of Smalltalk-80.

I've been wondering why or maybe I got it wrong.

Your thought is very much appreciated.

I really hope if Alan is not too busy we will be
able to hear it straight from the Dragon's mouth. ;-)

Cheers,

PhiHo

Hi --

I would gently suggest you are missing the points here.

You wrote at the end:
>As said Garrison Keillor:
>"I believe in looking reality straight in the eye and denying it."

I'm sure the irony was unintended.

The reality is that we need to use every possible route to try to get
content of a high level and learnability to children everywhere. If most of
the computer world does not like to use Smalltalk (this seems to be
reality) we shouldn't pout and stamp our feet about it, but try to make
examples that will help lift people's perception of what is possible.

If the Python folks want "Programming for everyone" and we can get them to
see that there are some important things that need to be done to make the
experience what it should be for children, then we should help them. Sure,
I'd love to see them understand more about Smalltalk, but it is the
psychology of that culture (and large parts of the Smalltalk culture, and
most programming cultures) for computer folks to want to come up with their
own ideas and solutions. E.g. it really bothers me that so many people on
this list are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!) But that's another
soapbox.

This is why computing is not a real scientific field, but much more like a
pop culture (and sometimes like psychopathic children tearing wings off
flies). If parts of the pop culture get interested in bigger problems (and
they are and are being forced by circumstances to) then we can and should
help them invent rounder wheels.

You are complaining about the irrationality of human beings. If they were
rational, then we wouldn't need to worry about education, and there
wouldn't have been a 3rd world in the 21st century. Most people's
imaginations are so undeveloped as to be essentially non-existent. This is
why we had to build more than a 1000 Altos, dozens of Ethernets and laser
printers before anyone, let alone Xerox was even willing to concede that
personal computing was a topic. As Butler Lampson as remarked "One of the
things that made this easier than it could have been was that no one in the
world was doing personal computing in the early 70s except for PARC. We had
the entire field to ourselves, and thus could take our time to choose the
riches paths we could imagine."

What's needed for this effort more than any other thing are compelling
examples that can be used as prototypes for many kinds of home grown
content. Part of "compelling" is the sense that the local groups can really
feel in control of their software experience. Not terribly un-rational
actually. It would be more rational if they were willing to learn
Smalltalk, but so what if they don't want to. The Internet is the real key
here, and the web part has been terribly botched. But I think the good
content is going to look more like Etoys than either Smalltalk or Python or
Ruby, so who cares about which religon is used?

Cheers,

Alan

At 09:03 AM 4/22/2006, Hilaire Fernandes wrote:

>Really? Eventually children suffering from anemia will die. Those day,
>each 5 second a kid (bellow 10) die because of mal-nutrition. Since the
>begining of this thread more than 34000 kids die for such reason, I
>can't agree the effect is the same.
>
>I just really feel unconfortable about plan, in the name of kids in
>developing countries, related to spend resources just to re-develop
>existing stuff.
>You know that Smalltalk and its environment are far superior to Python,
>so I cannot understand you stand "kid first" and at the same time your
>position about spending resources re-developping a graphical environment
>with an inferior vehicule. It is just non-sense. It will make more sense
>to re-developped more advanced language&environment on top of
>Smalltalk/Squeak. Was it not your initial plan?
>
>As said Garrison Keillor:
>"I believe in looking reality straight in the eye and denying it."
>
>Hilaire
>
>Alan Kay a écrit :
> > We have television instead of anemia, but it has a similar effect ...
> >
> > Cheers,
> >
> > Alan
> >
> > -------------
> >
> > At 07:06 AM 4/22/2006, Hilaire Fernandes wrote:
> >
> >> Alan Kay a écrit :
> >> > Yes, if only the world -- especially computer people -- were even
> >> > halfway rational and interesting in learning ... but this is one of

the
> >> > main goals of education (= enlightenment, etc.), and this is why
global
> >> > education for everyone has been my main interest over the years.
> >> >
> >> > As Seymour once said, "I wish the US was still a developing
country!").
> >> > We could say that about Europe also....
> >>
> >> Hum, not sure to understand. In developping country, one related
problem
> >> to education is to avoid children suffer from anemia, which make them
> >> unable to concentrate on anything.
> >>
> >> Hilaire
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >

----------

Sebastián Sastre

RE: YASoB (was Re: some news)

I see ST-80 as a little piece of rock (micro island) over the surface of the
allways changing Squeak waters. Even if you know how to swim very well,
sometimes you will want to grasp for a while on it. If agitation of change
becomes too chaotic, not even your best swimming skills can save you.
I'm waiting to see a continent somtime, a firm big space where things can
evolve putting their feets on it. For now the little rock it's a must.

Cheers,

Sebatian

> -----Mensaje original-----
> De: [hidden email]
> [mailto:[hidden email]] En
> nombre de SmallSqueak
> Enviado el: Martes, 16 de Mayo de 2006 06:24
> Para: [hidden email]
> Asunto: YASoB (was Re: some news)
>
>
>
> "Alan Kay" wrote:
>
> "... it really bothers me that so many people on this list
> are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!) But that's another soapbox."
>
>
> Dear Seasoned Squeakers,
>
> I have followed this list for a while and I have a feeling
> that Alan Kay is not particularly fond of Smalltalk-80.
>
> I've been wondering why or maybe I got it wrong.
>
> Your thought is very much appreciated.
>
> I really hope if Alan is not too busy we will be
> able to hear it straight from the Dragon's mouth. ;-)
>
> Cheers,
>
> PhiHo
>
>
>
> Hi --
>
> I would gently suggest you are missing the points here.
>
> You wrote at the end:
> >As said Garrison Keillor:
> >"I believe in looking reality straight in the eye and denying it."
>
> I'm sure the irony was unintended.
>
> The reality is that we need to use every possible route to
> try to get content of a high level and learnability to
> children everywhere. If most of the computer world does not
> like to use Smalltalk (this seems to be
> reality) we shouldn't pout and stamp our feet about it, but
> try to make examples that will help lift people's perception
> of what is possible.
>
> If the Python folks want "Programming for everyone" and we
> can get them to see that there are some important things that
> need to be done to make the experience what it should be for
> children, then we should help them. Sure, I'd love to see
> them understand more about Smalltalk, but it is the
> psychology of that culture (and large parts of the Smalltalk
> culture, and most programming cultures) for computer folks to
> want to come up with their own ideas and solutions. E.g. it
> really bothers me that so many people on this list are
> satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!) But that's another soapbox.
>
> This is why computing is not a real scientific field, but
> much more like a pop culture (and sometimes like psychopathic
> children tearing wings off flies). If parts of the pop
> culture get interested in bigger problems (and they are and
> are being forced by circumstances to) then we can and should
> help them invent rounder wheels.
>
> You are complaining about the irrationality of human beings.
> If they were rational, then we wouldn't need to worry about
> education, and there wouldn't have been a 3rd world in the
> 21st century. Most people's imaginations are so undeveloped
> as to be essentially non-existent. This is why we had to
> build more than a 1000 Altos, dozens of Ethernets and laser
> printers before anyone, let alone Xerox was even willing to
> concede that personal computing was a topic. As Butler
> Lampson as remarked "One of the things that made this easier
> than it could have been was that no one in the world was
> doing personal computing in the early 70s except for PARC. We
> had the entire field to ourselves, and thus could take our
> time to choose the riches paths we could imagine."
>
> What's needed for this effort more than any other thing are
> compelling examples that can be used as prototypes for many
> kinds of home grown content. Part of "compelling" is the
> sense that the local groups can really feel in control of
> their software experience. Not terribly un-rational actually.
> It would be more rational if they were willing to learn
> Smalltalk, but so what if they don't want to. The Internet is
> the real key here, and the web part has been terribly
> botched. But I think the good content is going to look more
> like Etoys than either Smalltalk or Python or Ruby, so who
> cares about which religon is used?
>
> Cheers,
>
> Alan
>
>
> At 09:03 AM 4/22/2006, Hilaire Fernandes wrote:
> >Really? Eventually children suffering from anemia will die.
> Those day,
> >each 5 second a kid (bellow 10) die because of
> mal-nutrition. Since the
> >begining of this thread more than 34000 kids die for such reason, I
> >can't agree the effect is the same.
> >
> >I just really feel unconfortable about plan, in the name of kids in
> >developing countries, related to spend resources just to re-develop
> >existing stuff.
> >You know that Smalltalk and its environment are far superior
> to Python,
> >so I cannot understand you stand "kid first" and at the same
> time your
> >position about spending resources re-developping a graphical
> environment
> >with an inferior vehicule. It is just non-sense. It will
> make more sense
> >to re-developped more advanced language&environment on top of
> >Smalltalk/Squeak. Was it not your initial plan?
> >
> >As said Garrison Keillor:
> >"I believe in looking reality straight in the eye and denying it."
> >
> >Hilaire
> >
> >Alan Kay a écrit :
> > > We have television instead of anemia, but it has a
> similar effect ...
> > >
> > > Cheers,
> > >
> > > Alan
> > >
> > > -------------
> > >
> > > At 07:06 AM 4/22/2006, Hilaire Fernandes wrote:
> > >
> > >> Alan Kay a écrit :
> > >> > Yes, if only the world -- especially computer people
> -- were even
> > >> > halfway rational and interesting in learning ... but
> this is one of
> the
> > >> > main goals of education (= enlightenment, etc.), and
> this is why
> global
> > >> > education for everyone has been my main interest over
> the years.
> > >> >
> > >> > As Seymour once said, "I wish the US was still a developing
> country!").
> > >> > We could say that about Europe also....
> > >>
> > >> Hum, not sure to understand. In developping country, one related
> problem
> > >> to education is to avoid children suffer from anemia,
> which make them
> > >> unable to concentrate on anything.
> > >>
> > >> Hilaire
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
>
>
>
>
> ----------
>
>

Torsten Sadowski-2

Where does "class new" come from?

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

Hello,

this might be a stupid question but where does the "new" class method come
from for object instantiation because I could find it neither in Object
nor in ProtoObject. I just wanted to find out where "initialize" is called
and what else might be done at object creation but now I'm completely
baffled.

Cheers, Torsten

Klaus D. Witzel

Re: Where does "class new" come from?

Hi Torsten,

on Tue, 16 May 2006 19:32:40 +0200, you
<[hidden email]> wrote:

> Hello,
>
> this might be a stupid question but where does the "new" class method
> come
> from for object instantiation because I could find it neither in Object
> nor in ProtoObject.

No, this is not a stupid question.

> I just wanted to find out where "initialize" is called
> and what else might be done at object creation but now I'm completely
> baffled.

In pre-Traits images this can bee seen with (Object class lookupSelector:
#new) who, nowadays this can be seen with (Object class lookupSelector:
#new) methodClass -> (Object class lookupSelector: #new) selector.

/Klaus

> Cheers, Torsten

Tom Phoenix

Re: Where does "class new" come from?

In reply to this post by Torsten Sadowski-2

On 5/16/06, Torsten Sadowski <[hidden email]> wrote:

> this might be a stupid question but where does the "new" class
> method come from for object instantiation because I could find it
> neither in Object nor in ProtoObject.

Mysterious, isn't it? But you can see how it happens if you select the
text "Object new" in a Workspace and choose "debug it" yellow-button
menu.

The trick is that Object class is an instance of Class, which inherits
from Behavior. So you're seeing Class(Behavior)>>new.

Hope this helps!

--Tom Phoenix

Hans-Martin Mosner

Re: Where does "class new" come from?

In reply to this post by Torsten Sadowski-2

Torsten Sadowski wrote:

>Hello,
>
>this might be a stupid question but where does the "new" class method come
>from for object instantiation because I could find it neither in Object
>nor in ProtoObject. I just wanted to find out where "initialize" is called
>and what else might be done at object creation but now I'm completely
>baffled.
>
>
All class objects inherit from Class, ClassDescription, Behavior.

So if you inspect "String class withAllSuperclasses" you'll find the
complete inheritance chain.

Behavior is where the #new method is implemented. This class basically
defines the low-level stuff that's needed to describe and create instances.
ClassDescription, Class and Metaclass add stuff to organize classes and
methods, and to create the metaclass system of Smalltalk.

Cheers,
Hans-Martin

Ken Causey-3

Re: Where does "class new" come from?

In reply to this post by Torsten Sadowski-2

You can investigate this in a couple of ways. First of all you could
open a Method Finder or Message Names and search for all implementors of
'new'. However there's quite a lot of them. One thing you will notice
however is that pretty much every implementation is on the class side.
This should clue you in to the fact that in general you are sending the
'new' message to a Class object, in other words an instance of the class
'Class'.

Find Class in a browser and then choose 'Browse Protocol' from the
context menu from the pane that lists the class names. Looking through
the categories you will find 'instance creation' and selecting that
gives you a list including 'new (Behavior)' The name in parentheses is
the class on which this method is defined and selecting this in the list
gives you the implementation.

Ken

On Tue, 2006-05-16 at 19:32 +0200, Torsten Sadowski wrote:

> Hello,
>
> this might be a stupid question but where does the "new" class method come
> from for object instantiation because I could find it neither in Object
> nor in ProtoObject. I just wanted to find out where "initialize" is called
> and what else might be done at object creation but now I'm completely
> baffled.
>
> Cheers, Torsten
>
>
>

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Jecel Assumpcao Jr

YASoB (was Re: some news)

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

PhiHo,

> "Alan Kay" wrote:
>
> "... it really bothers me that so many people on this list
> are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!)
> But that's another soapbox."
>
>
> Dear Seasoned Squeakers,
>
> I have followed this list for a while and I have a feeling
> that Alan Kay is not particularly fond of Smalltalk-80.
>
> I've been wondering why or maybe I got it wrong.
>
> Your thought is very much appreciated.
>
> I really hope if Alan is not too busy we will be
> able to hear it straight from the Dragon's mouth. ;-)

Rather than speaking for Alan, I will just quote two paragraphs from his
"Early History of Smalltalk" (there is a link to a PDF version in Stef's
Free Books page and there is a html version with some missing pictures
at http://gagne.homedns.org/~tgagne/contrib/EarlyHistoryST.html):

-------
I will try to show where most of the influences came from and how they
were transformed in the magnetic field formed by the new personal
computing metaphor. It was the attitudes as well as the great ideas of
the pioneers that helped Smalltalk get invented. Many of the people I
admired most at this time--such as Ivan Sutherland, Marvin Minsky,
Seymour Papert, Gordon Moore, Bob Barton, Dave Evans, Butler Lampson,
Jerome Bruner, and others--seemed to have a splendid sense that their
creations, though wonderful by relative standards, were not near to the
absolute thresholds that had to be crossed. Small minds try to form
religions, the great ones just want better routes up the mountain. Where
Newton said he saw further by standing on the shoulders of giants,
computer scientists all too often stand on each other's toes. Myopia is
still a problem where there are giants' shoulders to stand
on--"outsight" is better than insight--but it can be minimized by using
glasses whose lenses are highly sensitive to esthetics and criticism.
-------

and

-------
New ideas go through stages of acceptance, both from within and without.
>From within, the sequence moves from "barely seeing" a pattern several
times, then noting it but not perceiving its "cosmic" significance, then
using it operationally in several areas, then comes a "grand rotation"
in which the pattern becomes the center of a new way of thinking, and
finally, it turns into the same kind of inflexible religion that it
originally broke away from. From without, as Schopenhauer noted, the new
idea is first denounced as the work of the insane, in a few years it is
considered obvious and mundane, and finally the original denouncers will
claim to have invented it.
-------

My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by relative
standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like Smalltalk
(what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").

--Jecel

Torsten Sadowski-2

Re: Where does "class new" come from?

In reply to this post by Klaus D. Witzel

Thanks to everyone for the fast and complete answer.

Torsten

SmallSqueak

Re: YASoB (was Re: some news)

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

Jecel,

Sorry couldn't get back to you sooner.

Quota for SmallSqueak account (incoming+outgoing)
got exceeded and he coudn't send any mail to the list ;-)

>
> Rather than speaking for Alan, I will just quote two paragraphs from his
> "Early History of Smalltalk" (there is a link to a PDF version in Stef's
> Free Books page and there is a html version with some missing pictures
> at http://gagne.homedns.org/~tgagne/contrib/EarlyHistoryST.html):
>

Many thanks for the link.

Many thanks to whoever took the time to make this
HTML version of the article available.

I know there is a scanned version but I found it hard to read.

I browsed through it and been wondering who is Semour Papert

"A month later, I finally visited Semour Papert..."

and who is Can:
"Ted went back to CMU but Can was still around egging me on."

Early Smalltalk is much more interesting than Squeak ;-) :

"It evaluted 3 = 4
very slowly (it was "glacial", as Butler liked to say)
but the answer alwas came out 7."

Who is Check:

"Just before Check started work on the machine ..."
...
"Check had started his "bet" on November 22, 1972."

...
...
...

It is very much appreciated if some seasoned Smalltalkers
would help to proof read this HTML version.

I would like to suggest that The Squeak Foundation would
ask for permission to put it on The Foundation home page.

Many thanks in advance.

Cheers,

PhiHo

----- Original Message -----
From: "Jecel Assumpcao Jr" <[hidden email]>
To: "The general-purpose Squeak developers list"
<[hidden email]>
Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 2:44 PM
Subject: YASoB (was Re: some news)

> PhiHo,
>
> > "Alan Kay" wrote:
> >
> > "... it really bothers me that so many people on this list
> > are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!)
> > But that's another soapbox."
> >
> >
> > Dear Seasoned Squeakers,
> >
> > I have followed this list for a while and I have a feeling
> > that Alan Kay is not particularly fond of Smalltalk-80.
> >
> > I've been wondering why or maybe I got it wrong.
> >
> > Your thought is very much appreciated.
> >
> > I really hope if Alan is not too busy we will be
> > able to hear it straight from the Dragon's mouth. ;-)
>
> Rather than speaking for Alan, I will just quote two paragraphs from his
> "Early History of Smalltalk" (there is a link to a PDF version in Stef's
> Free Books page and there is a html version with some missing pictures
> at http://gagne.homedns.org/~tgagne/contrib/EarlyHistoryST.html):
>
> -------
> I will try to show where most of the influences came from and how they
> were transformed in the magnetic field formed by the new personal
> computing metaphor. It was the attitudes as well as the great ideas of
> the pioneers that helped Smalltalk get invented. Many of the people I
> admired most at this time--such as Ivan Sutherland, Marvin Minsky,
> Seymour Papert, Gordon Moore, Bob Barton, Dave Evans, Butler Lampson,
> Jerome Bruner, and others--seemed to have a splendid sense that their
> creations, though wonderful by relative standards, were not near to the
> absolute thresholds that had to be crossed. Small minds try to form
> religions, the great ones just want better routes up the mountain. Where
> Newton said he saw further by standing on the shoulders of giants,
> computer scientists all too often stand on each other's toes. Myopia is
> still a problem where there are giants' shoulders to stand
> on--"outsight" is better than insight--but it can be minimized by using
> glasses whose lenses are highly sensitive to esthetics and criticism.
> -------
>
> and
>
> -------
> New ideas go through stages of acceptance, both from within and without.
> >From within, the sequence moves from "barely seeing" a pattern several
> times, then noting it but not perceiving its "cosmic" significance, then
> using it operationally in several areas, then comes a "grand rotation"
> in which the pattern becomes the center of a new way of thinking, and
> finally, it turns into the same kind of inflexible religion that it
> originally broke away from. From without, as Schopenhauer noted, the new
> idea is first denounced as the work of the insane, in a few years it is
> considered obvious and mundane, and finally the original denouncers will
> claim to have invented it.
> -------
>
> My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by relative
> standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
> inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
> who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
> assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like Smalltalk
> (what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").
>
> --Jecel
>

Brad Fuller

Re: YASoB (was Re: some news)

SmallSqueak wrote:
> I browsed through it and been wondering who is Semour Papert
>
> "A month later, I finally visited Semour Papert..."
>
That's a typo. Probably Seymour Papert
http://www.papert.org/

SmallSqueak

Re: YASoB (was Re: some news)

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

Jecel ,

>
> My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by relative
> standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
> inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
> who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
> assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like Smalltalk
> (what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").
>

I have a feeling that to many Smalltakers, in general, there have been
no advances in software engineering and computer language design
since Smalltalk was invented.

When was Smalltalk really invented?

Was it in 1972 or 1976 or 1980?

Did Squeak Central insist on creating things that are worse than
Smalltalk-72 and the crowd assumed that it is automatically better
than something "old" like Smalltalk-72?

For that matter, did the commercial Smalltalk vendors insist
likewise?

Cheers,

PhiHo

----- Original Message -----
From: "Jecel Assumpcao Jr" <[hidden email]>
To: "The general-purpose Squeak developers list"
<[hidden email]>
Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 2:44 PM
Subject: YASoB (was Re: some news)

stéphane ducasse-2

Re: YASoB (was Re: some news)

Have you really looked at Smalltalk-72?
Do you think that you could build a real system with each class been
able to define
its own syntax?
It depends what is the goal of the language. If this is to build
application it seems that ST-80
is better than 72. At least with my taste.

Stef

> I have a feeling that to many Smalltakers, in general, there
> have been
> no advances in software engineering and computer language design
> since Smalltalk was invented.
>
> When was Smalltalk really invented?
>
> Was it in 1972 or 1976 or 1980?
>
> Did Squeak Central insist on creating things that are worse than
> Smalltalk-72 and the crowd assumed that it is automatically better
> than something "old" like Smalltalk-72?
>
> For that matter, did the commercial Smalltalk vendors insist
> likewise?
>
> Cheers,
>
> PhiHo
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Jecel Assumpcao Jr" <[hidden email]>
> To: "The general-purpose Squeak developers list"
> <[hidden email]>
> Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 2:44 PM
> Subject: YASoB (was Re: some news)
>
>
>> PhiHo,
>>
>>> "Alan Kay" wrote:
>>>
>>> "... it really bothers me that so many people on this list
>>> are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!)
>>> But that's another soapbox."
>>>
>>>
>>> Dear Seasoned Squeakers,
>>>
>>> I have followed this list for a while and I have a feeling
>>> that Alan Kay is not particularly fond of Smalltalk-80.
>>>
>>> I've been wondering why or maybe I got it wrong.
>>>
>>> Your thought is very much appreciated.
>>>
>>> I really hope if Alan is not too busy we will be
>>> able to hear it straight from the Dragon's mouth. ;-)
>>
>> Rather than speaking for Alan, I will just quote two paragraphs
>> from his
>> "Early History of Smalltalk" (there is a link to a PDF version in
>> Stef's
>> Free Books page and there is a html version with some missing
>> pictures
>> at http://gagne.homedns.org/~tgagne/contrib/EarlyHistoryST.html):
>>
>> -------
>> I will try to show where most of the influences came from and how
>> they
>> were transformed in the magnetic field formed by the new personal
>> computing metaphor. It was the attitudes as well as the great
>> ideas of
>> the pioneers that helped Smalltalk get invented. Many of the people I
>> admired most at this time--such as Ivan Sutherland, Marvin Minsky,
>> Seymour Papert, Gordon Moore, Bob Barton, Dave Evans, Butler Lampson,
>> Jerome Bruner, and others--seemed to have a splendid sense that their
>> creations, though wonderful by relative standards, were not near
>> to the
>> absolute thresholds that had to be crossed. Small minds try to form
>> religions, the great ones just want better routes up the mountain.
>> Where
>> Newton said he saw further by standing on the shoulders of giants,
>> computer scientists all too often stand on each other's toes.
>> Myopia is
>> still a problem where there are giants' shoulders to stand
>> on--"outsight" is better than insight--but it can be minimized by
>> using
>> glasses whose lenses are highly sensitive to esthetics and criticism.
>> -------
>>
>> and
>>
>> -------
>> New ideas go through stages of acceptance, both from within and
>> without.
>>> From within, the sequence moves from "barely seeing" a pattern
>>> several
>> times, then noting it but not perceiving its "cosmic"
>> significance, then
>> using it operationally in several areas, then comes a "grand
>> rotation"
>> in which the pattern becomes the center of a new way of thinking, and
>> finally, it turns into the same kind of inflexible religion that it
>> originally broke away from. From without, as Schopenhauer noted,
>> the new
>> idea is first denounced as the work of the insane, in a few years
>> it is
>> considered obvious and mundane, and finally the original
>> denouncers will
>> claim to have invented it.
>> -------
>>
>> My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by
>> relative
>> standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
>> inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
>> who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
>> assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like
>> Smalltalk
>> (what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").
>>
>> --Jecel
>>
>
>

Jecel Assumpcao Jr

better or worse (was: YASoB)

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

PhiHo,

> Jecel ,
>
> >
> > My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by relative
> > standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
> > inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
> > who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
> > assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like Smalltalk
> > (what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").
> >
>
> I have a feeling that to many Smalltakers, in general, there have been
> no advances in software engineering and computer language design
> since Smalltalk was invented.

Lispers feel the same way. We have to be careful not to make the
opposite mistake ("only the old stuff was good") which is just another
form of chronological snobbery.

> When was Smalltalk really invented?
>
> Was it in 1972 or 1976 or 1980?

In 1972 we got the seed (objects and messages) and in 1976 the current
form (vm, classes as objects, inheritance).

> Did Squeak Central insist on creating things that are worse than
> Smalltalk-72 and the crowd assumed that it is automatically better
> than something "old" like Smalltalk-72?

"Better" and "worse" don't always apply - I can't compare Smalltalk with
Prolog, for example. But I can compare Smalltalk with Java or Ruby even
though it is still complicated even in these cases.

As far as I know the goal of Squeak Central was to create the eToys
system and they needed a universal platform to build it on. They had no
wish to spend their time on such a platform so given the hype around
Java back then they considered using that. The shocking part was that
even though it was much newer and borrowed some aspects from Smalltalk
it was in general "worse". In part this was on purpose ("oh.... the
average programmer can't understand or handle that...") and in part it
was ignorance (Guy Steele was brought in late in the project to help
with the documentation and ended up fixing some minor technical problems
but had to leave the major ones alone) but it was felt at the time that
doing eToys in Java would be a larger effort than cleaning up the old
Apple Smalltalk and using that. If my impressions of Squeak and Java
history are wrong I hope someone will correct me.

Note that John Maloney came to Squeak Central from the Self project.
Some people (including me) feel that Self is better than Smalltalk-80
but John said in an interview that going back to the older system made
him more comfortable (I understood him to mean specially the "whole
system" view that the browser gives you compared to the more piecemeal
views that you get with Self's outliners). And there are tradeoffs: when
Logo was created from Lisp it dropped closures (making it worse) because
they got in the way of the language's goals.

What I am saying is: imagine that someone is creating a new language
today. And then you look at what they are doing and give them a good
demo of APL. They might say "I considered that, but in this part of my
language...." or (which is far more common) they might say "Wow! I never
imagined there could be something like that!"

Certainly the latter never was the case for Squeak Central.

> For that matter, did the commercial Smalltalk vendors insist
> likewise?

Vendors are by their very nature conservative (their customers value
stability). David Simmons (SmalltalkAgents, S#) seems to me to be the
only one from that part of the world who is willing to explore new
ideas.

-- Jecel

Alan Kay

Re: YASoB (was Re: some news)

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

Hi --At 09:17 AM 5/18/2006, SmallSqueak wrote:

--snip--

> I browsed through it and been wondering who is Semour Papert
>
> "A month later, I finally visited Semour Papert..."

Seymour Papert, mathematician, educator, and the main inventor of Logo.
Wikipedia has some bio information.

> and who is Can:
> "Ted went back to CMU but Can was still around egging me on."

This must be Dan Ingalls.

> Early Smalltalk is much more interesting than Squeak ;-) :
>
> "It evaluted 3 = 4

3+4

> very slowly (it was "glacial", as Butler liked to say)
> but the answer alwas came out 7."
>
> Who is Check:
>
> "Just before Check started work on the machine ..."
> ...
> "Check had started his "bet" on November 22, 1972."

Chuck Thacker, the main inventor and builder of the Xerox PARC Alto.

Cheers,

Alan

> ...
> ...
> ...
>
>
> It is very much appreciated if some seasoned Smalltalkers
> would help to proof read this HTML version.
>
> I would like to suggest that The Squeak Foundation would
> ask for permission to put it on The Foundation home page.
>
> Many thanks in advance.
>
> Cheers,
>
> PhiHo
>
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Jecel Assumpcao Jr" <[hidden email]>
>To: "The general-purpose Squeak developers list"
><[hidden email]>
>Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 2:44 PM
>Subject: YASoB (was Re: some news)
>
>
> > PhiHo,
> >
> > > "Alan Kay" wrote:
> > >
> > > "... it really bothers me that so many people on this list
> > > are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!)
> > > But that's another soapbox."
> > >
> > >
> > > Dear Seasoned Squeakers,
> > >
> > > I have followed this list for a while and I have a feeling
> > > that Alan Kay is not particularly fond of Smalltalk-80.
> > >
> > > I've been wondering why or maybe I got it wrong.
> > >
> > > Your thought is very much appreciated.
> > >
> > > I really hope if Alan is not too busy we will be
> > > able to hear it straight from the Dragon's mouth. ;-)
> >
> > Rather than speaking for Alan, I will just quote two paragraphs from his
> > "Early History of Smalltalk" (there is a link to a PDF version in Stef's
> > Free Books page and there is a html version with some missing pictures
> > at http://gagne.homedns.org/~tgagne/contrib/EarlyHistoryST.html):
> >
> > -------
> > I will try to show where most of the influences came from and how they
> > were transformed in the magnetic field formed by the new personal
> > computing metaphor. It was the attitudes as well as the great ideas of
> > the pioneers that helped Smalltalk get invented. Many of the people I
> > admired most at this time--such as Ivan Sutherland, Marvin Minsky,
> > Seymour Papert, Gordon Moore, Bob Barton, Dave Evans, Butler Lampson,
> > Jerome Bruner, and others--seemed to have a splendid sense that their
> > creations, though wonderful by relative standards, were not near to the
> > absolute thresholds that had to be crossed. Small minds try to form
> > religions, the great ones just want better routes up the mountain. Where
> > Newton said he saw further by standing on the shoulders of giants,
> > computer scientists all too often stand on each other's toes. Myopia is
> > still a problem where there are giants' shoulders to stand
> > on--"outsight" is better than insight--but it can be minimized by using
> > glasses whose lenses are highly sensitive to esthetics and criticism.
> > -------
> >
> > and
> >
> > -------
> > New ideas go through stages of acceptance, both from within and without.
> > >From within, the sequence moves from "barely seeing" a pattern several
> > times, then noting it but not perceiving its "cosmic" significance, then
> > using it operationally in several areas, then comes a "grand rotation"
> > in which the pattern becomes the center of a new way of thinking, and
> > finally, it turns into the same kind of inflexible religion that it
> > originally broke away from. From without, as Schopenhauer noted, the new
> > idea is first denounced as the work of the insane, in a few years it is
> > considered obvious and mundane, and finally the original denouncers will
> > claim to have invented it.
> > -------
> >
> > My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by relative
> > standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
> > inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
> > who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
> > assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like Smalltalk
> > (what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").
> >
> > --Jecel
> >

Alan Kay

Re: YASoB (was Re: some news)

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

At 10:03 AM 5/18/2006, SmallSqueak wrote:
--snip--

> I have a feeling that to many Smalltakers, in general, there have been
> no advances in software engineering and computer language design
> since Smalltalk was invented.
>
> When was Smalltalk really invented?

The idea of objects as message sending computers came to me in Nov 66. I
did several OOP languages between then and 1970.

> Was it in 1972 or 1976 or 1980?

My original plan for Smalltalk was to make a Logo-like language that
combined objects with Carl Hewitt's PLANNER (a pattern directed language
that anticipated most abilities of Prolog by many years) and Ned Irons IMP
(another pattern directed language but aimed at extension by end-users).
This design is now called Smalltalk-71.

I was working on this when the hallway "bet" with Dan Ingalls and Ted
Kaehler happened in Sept 1972. I worked for several weeks to write a less
than one page McCarthy-like eval for an OOP language that could parse its
own messages. Dan implemented this in Oct 1972, and all of a sudden we had
a working system, which was put right on the Alto when it started working a
few months later.

> Did Squeak Central insist on creating things that are worse than
> Smalltalk-72 and the crowd assumed that it is automatically better
> than something "old" like Smalltalk-72?

Not really. Smalltalk-76 in many ways was the best compromise between the
need for speed and a number of the good features of Smalltalk-72. The
process after Smalltalk-72 was very conditioned by adult programmers making
a system for more for themselves than having children be able to use it as
a top priority.

> For that matter, did the commercial Smalltalk vendors insist
> likewise?

The big problem is that most programmers have a very hard time thinking
about facilitating programming for people who are not like them, and they
also have a very hard time understanding media.

Cheers,

Alan

> Cheers,
>
> PhiHo
>
>----- Original Message -----
>From: "Jecel Assumpcao Jr" <[hidden email]>
>To: "The general-purpose Squeak developers list"
><[hidden email]>
>Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 2:44 PM
>Subject: YASoB (was Re: some news)
>
>
> > PhiHo,
> >
> > > "Alan Kay" wrote:
> > >
> > > "... it really bothers me that so many people on this list
> > > are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!)
> > > But that's another soapbox."
> > >
> > >
> > > Dear Seasoned Squeakers,
> > >
> > > I have followed this list for a while and I have a feeling
> > > that Alan Kay is not particularly fond of Smalltalk-80.
> > >
> > > I've been wondering why or maybe I got it wrong.
> > >
> > > Your thought is very much appreciated.
> > >
> > > I really hope if Alan is not too busy we will be
> > > able to hear it straight from the Dragon's mouth. ;-)
> >
> > Rather than speaking for Alan, I will just quote two paragraphs from his
> > "Early History of Smalltalk" (there is a link to a PDF version in Stef's
> > Free Books page and there is a html version with some missing pictures
> > at http://gagne.homedns.org/~tgagne/contrib/EarlyHistoryST.html):
> >
> > -------
> > I will try to show where most of the influences came from and how they
> > were transformed in the magnetic field formed by the new personal
> > computing metaphor. It was the attitudes as well as the great ideas of
> > the pioneers that helped Smalltalk get invented. Many of the people I
> > admired most at this time--such as Ivan Sutherland, Marvin Minsky,
> > Seymour Papert, Gordon Moore, Bob Barton, Dave Evans, Butler Lampson,
> > Jerome Bruner, and others--seemed to have a splendid sense that their
> > creations, though wonderful by relative standards, were not near to the
> > absolute thresholds that had to be crossed. Small minds try to form
> > religions, the great ones just want better routes up the mountain. Where
> > Newton said he saw further by standing on the shoulders of giants,
> > computer scientists all too often stand on each other's toes. Myopia is
> > still a problem where there are giants' shoulders to stand
> > on--"outsight" is better than insight--but it can be minimized by using
> > glasses whose lenses are highly sensitive to esthetics and criticism.
> > -------
> >
> > and
> >
> > -------
> > New ideas go through stages of acceptance, both from within and without.
> > >From within, the sequence moves from "barely seeing" a pattern several
> > times, then noting it but not perceiving its "cosmic" significance, then
> > using it operationally in several areas, then comes a "grand rotation"
> > in which the pattern becomes the center of a new way of thinking, and
> > finally, it turns into the same kind of inflexible religion that it
> > originally broke away from. From without, as Schopenhauer noted, the new
> > idea is first denounced as the work of the insane, in a few years it is
> > considered obvious and mundane, and finally the original denouncers will
> > claim to have invented it.
> > -------
> >
> > My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by relative
> > standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
> > inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
> > who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
> > assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like Smalltalk
> > (what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").
> >
> > --Jecel
> >

Alan Kay

Re: better or worse (was: YASoB)

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

Good characterizations!

Cheers,

Alan

------------

At 11:44 AM 5/18/2006, Jecel Assumpcao Jr wrote:

>PhiHo,
> > Jecel ,
> >
> > >
> > > My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by relative
> > > standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
> > > inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
> > > who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
> > > assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like Smalltalk
> > > (what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").
> > >
> >
> > I have a feeling that to many Smalltakers, in general, there have been
> > no advances in software engineering and computer language design
> > since Smalltalk was invented.
>
>Lispers feel the same way. We have to be careful not to make the
>opposite mistake ("only the old stuff was good") which is just another
>form of chronological snobbery.
>
> > When was Smalltalk really invented?
> >
> > Was it in 1972 or 1976 or 1980?
>
>In 1972 we got the seed (objects and messages) and in 1976 the current
>form (vm, classes as objects, inheritance).
>
> > Did Squeak Central insist on creating things that are worse than
> > Smalltalk-72 and the crowd assumed that it is automatically better
> > than something "old" like Smalltalk-72?
>
>"Better" and "worse" don't always apply - I can't compare Smalltalk with
>Prolog, for example. But I can compare Smalltalk with Java or Ruby even
>though it is still complicated even in these cases.
>
>As far as I know the goal of Squeak Central was to create the eToys
>system and they needed a universal platform to build it on. They had no
>wish to spend their time on such a platform so given the hype around
>Java back then they considered using that. The shocking part was that
>even though it was much newer and borrowed some aspects from Smalltalk
>it was in general "worse". In part this was on purpose ("oh.... the
>average programmer can't understand or handle that...") and in part it
>was ignorance (Guy Steele was brought in late in the project to help
>with the documentation and ended up fixing some minor technical problems
>but had to leave the major ones alone) but it was felt at the time that
>doing eToys in Java would be a larger effort than cleaning up the old
>Apple Smalltalk and using that. If my impressions of Squeak and Java
>history are wrong I hope someone will correct me.
>
>Note that John Maloney came to Squeak Central from the Self project.
>Some people (including me) feel that Self is better than Smalltalk-80
>but John said in an interview that going back to the older system made
>him more comfortable (I understood him to mean specially the "whole
>system" view that the browser gives you compared to the more piecemeal
>views that you get with Self's outliners). And there are tradeoffs: when
>Logo was created from Lisp it dropped closures (making it worse) because
>they got in the way of the language's goals.
>
>What I am saying is: imagine that someone is creating a new language
>today. And then you look at what they are doing and give them a good
>demo of APL. They might say "I considered that, but in this part of my
>language...." or (which is far more common) they might say "Wow! I never
>imagined there could be something like that!"
>
>Certainly the latter never was the case for Squeak Central.
>
> > For that matter, did the commercial Smalltalk vendors insist
> > likewise?
>
>Vendors are by their very nature conservative (their customers value
>stability). David Simmons (SmalltalkAgents, S#) seems to me to be the
>only one from that part of the world who is willing to explore new
>ideas.
>
>-- Jecel

Ralph Johnson

Re: better or worse (was: YASoB)

In reply to this post by SmallSqueak

On 5/18/06, Jecel Assumpcao Jr <[hidden email]> wrote:
> > When was Smalltalk really invented?
> >
> > Was it in 1972 or 1976 or 1980?
>
> In 1972 we got the seed (objects and messages) and in 1976 the current
> form (vm, classes as objects, inheritance).

What does "invented" mean? And what is Smalltalk?

In my opinion, the class library is as important as the vm and the
language syntax, and the culture is as important as the class library.
They have been developing continually. So, I do not think that
Smalltalk has ever been created. We can say when key ideas were
invented, but Smalltalk is much more than vm and classes as objects.

I've been programming in Smalltalk since 1985. It (and I) have
changed a lot since then. Smalltalk in 1985 had changed a fair bit
since the original Smalltalk-80. For example, the pluggable MVC was
part of Smalltalk-80 R 2, but not the original R1, and understanding
pluggability was important for me. Pluggability has become an
important part of the culture.

Of course, Smalltalk hasn't changed as much as it should have, but
that is a different story.

-Ralph Johnson

SmallSqueak

Re: YASoB (was Re: some news)

In reply to this post by stéphane ducasse-2

"stéphane ducasse" wrote:

> Have you really looked at Smalltalk-72?

Actually, not yet.

I am hoping that some good souls will shed some light,
so that I can decide whether I should look at Smalltalk-80
or 76 or 72 or even Squeak 3.9 beta ;-)

Nah, maybe, I shall look at Dolphin.
(after it's been Traitorised, of course ;-) ;-)

> Do you think that you could build a real system

Please define "real system".

Do you mean Smalltalk-72 support only integers ;-)

> with each class been able to define its own syntax?

Very interesting.

I didn't know that, thanks for telling, Stef.

Why do you think you cannot build a real system with
St-72 because each class in St-72 can define its own
syntax.

> It depends what is the goal of the language.

This is a billion dollars question.

> If this is to build application it seems that ST-80
> is better than 72. At least with my taste.
>

So the goal of ST-80 (or should it be St-80) is for
building application.

By application you mean real commercial stuff like
MS Office or Oracle DBMS?

Would you please tell what's the goal of St-72?

For that matter, what's the goal for Squeak?

Cheers,

PhiHo

>
> > I have a feeling that to many Smalltakers, in general, there
> > have been
> > no advances in software engineering and computer language design
> > since Smalltalk was invented.
> >
> > When was Smalltalk really invented?
> >
> > Was it in 1972 or 1976 or 1980?
> >
> > Did Squeak Central insist on creating things that are worse than
> > Smalltalk-72 and the crowd assumed that it is automatically better
> > than something "old" like Smalltalk-72?
> >
> > For that matter, did the commercial Smalltalk vendors insist
> > likewise?
> >
> > Cheers,
> >
> > PhiHo
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Jecel Assumpcao Jr" <[hidden email]>
> > To: "The general-purpose Squeak developers list"
> > <[hidden email]>
> > Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 2:44 PM
> > Subject: YASoB (was Re: some news)
> >
> >
> >> PhiHo,
> >>
> >>> "Alan Kay" wrote:
> >>>
> >>> "... it really bothers me that so many people on this list
> >>> are satisfied with Smalltalk-80 (Yikes!)
> >>> But that's another soapbox."
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> Dear Seasoned Squeakers,
> >>>
> >>> I have followed this list for a while and I have a feeling
> >>> that Alan Kay is not particularly fond of Smalltalk-80.
> >>>
> >>> I've been wondering why or maybe I got it wrong.
> >>>
> >>> Your thought is very much appreciated.
> >>>
> >>> I really hope if Alan is not too busy we will be
> >>> able to hear it straight from the Dragon's mouth. ;-)
> >>
> >> Rather than speaking for Alan, I will just quote two paragraphs
> >> from his
> >> "Early History of Smalltalk" (there is a link to a PDF version in
> >> Stef's
> >> Free Books page and there is a html version with some missing
> >> pictures
> >> at http://gagne.homedns.org/~tgagne/contrib/EarlyHistoryST.html):
> >>
> >> -------
> >> I will try to show where most of the influences came from and how
> >> they
> >> were transformed in the magnetic field formed by the new personal
> >> computing metaphor. It was the attitudes as well as the great
> >> ideas of
> >> the pioneers that helped Smalltalk get invented. Many of the people I
> >> admired most at this time--such as Ivan Sutherland, Marvin Minsky,
> >> Seymour Papert, Gordon Moore, Bob Barton, Dave Evans, Butler Lampson,
> >> Jerome Bruner, and others--seemed to have a splendid sense that their
> >> creations, though wonderful by relative standards, were not near
> >> to the
> >> absolute thresholds that had to be crossed. Small minds try to form
> >> religions, the great ones just want better routes up the mountain.
> >> Where
> >> Newton said he saw further by standing on the shoulders of giants,
> >> computer scientists all too often stand on each other's toes.
> >> Myopia is
> >> still a problem where there are giants' shoulders to stand
> >> on--"outsight" is better than insight--but it can be minimized by
> >> using
> >> glasses whose lenses are highly sensitive to esthetics and criticism.
> >> -------
> >>
> >> and
> >>
> >> -------
> >> New ideas go through stages of acceptance, both from within and
> >> without.
> >>> From within, the sequence moves from "barely seeing" a pattern
> >>> several
> >> times, then noting it but not perceiving its "cosmic"
> >> significance, then
> >> using it operationally in several areas, then comes a "grand
> >> rotation"
> >> in which the pattern becomes the center of a new way of thinking, and
> >> finally, it turns into the same kind of inflexible religion that it
> >> originally broke away from. From without, as Schopenhauer noted,
> >> the new
> >> idea is first denounced as the work of the insane, in a few years
> >> it is
> >> considered obvious and mundane, and finally the original
> >> denouncers will
> >> claim to have invented it.
> >> -------
> >>
> >> My comment on this is that Smalltalk-80 was indeed wonderful by
> >> relative
> >> standards, but it shouldn't become a religion that keeps us from
> >> inventing something better. Though this isn't nearly as sad as people
> >> who keep insisting on creating things that are worse while the public
> >> assumes it is automatically better than something "old" like
> >> Smalltalk
> >> (what C. S. Lewis called "chronological snobbery").
> >>
> >> --Jecel
> >>
> >
> >
>
>

Jecel Assumpcao Jr

Re: better or worse (was: YASoB)

In reply to this post by Ralph Johnson

Ralph Johnson wrote on Thu, 18 May 2006 14:23:23 -0500
> On 5/18/06, Jecel Assumpcao Jr wrote:
> > In 1972 we got the seed (objects and messages) and in 1976 the current
> > form (vm, classes as objects, inheritance).
>
> What does "invented" mean? And what is Smalltalk?

What does "mean" mean?

:-) Just kidding!

> In my opinion, the class library is as important as the vm and the
> language syntax, and the culture is as important as the class library.
> They have been developing continually. So, I do not think that
> Smalltalk has ever been created. We can say when key ideas were
> invented, but Smalltalk is much more than vm and classes as objects.

Exactly.

One thing that shocked me was how many Smalltalkers didn't like Self or
were at least very indifferent to it. I think it was Mario Wolczko who
said "Self is like Smalltalk, only more so!", which is how I feel about
it. But obviously to other people it was something very different. This
is sort of like the native widgets vs Morphic or scripting vs image
debates. The community is sufficiently varied that "what is Smalltalk?"
isn't easily answered.

> I've been programming in Smalltalk since 1985. It (and I) have
> changed a lot since then. Smalltalk in 1985 had changed a fair bit
> since the original Smalltalk-80. For example, the pluggable MVC was
> part of Smalltalk-80 R 2, but not the original R1, and understanding
> pluggability was important for me. Pluggability has become an
> important part of the culture.

Yeah, though it took a while for it to spread to the Digitalk side of
the tracks.

> Of course, Smalltalk hasn't changed as much as it should have, but
> that is a different story.

Well, that is the story I am particularly interested in.

-- Jecel